Food Education Program

Our Food Education program combats food insecurity at its source by supporting participants in the development of healthy eating behaviors they’ll acquire through improved food knowledge and cooking skills.

Founded on the belief that everyone deserves access to reliable, high-quality nutrition, we function to enrich and connect our community through food.

Nutrition knowledge and cooking skills are strongly associated with more healthful food choices, but not everyone has access to quality comprehensive food education.

Our program breaks down traditional barriers to nutrition education by engaging users in supported, interactive virtual learning experiences they can participate in from their own homes and at their own pace through a series of hands-on, collaborative workshops.

We empower our neighbors to feed themselves and others by teaching them how to find and choose affordable ingredients, and giving them the skills to cook simple yet nutritious and delicious meals for themselves and others. Our programming is based on a flexible, community-based virtual learning environment specifically designed to accommodate the demands of a busy lifestyle and the constraints of a low-income budget.

Workshops will combine the powerful perspective of cross-cultural community collaboration with the working expertise of a skilled team of local chef instructors led by Chef Jacobsen Valentine. Each cooking session is designed to highlight the story behind the dish, prompting participants to think about its significance to its culture of origin, to be curious about what food means to others, and to be reflective about what food means to themselves.

Through our workshops, we plan to give our participants the extra bit of support they need to learn about their personal relationship with food, and support them in the development of their unique identity as informed consumers and capable cooks.

The workshops will expand participants’ knowledge of the body’s nutritional needs, and how to meet them with low-cost ingredients that are readily available. The cooking classes will build competency in combining these separate ingredients into dishes that provide a balanced blend of essential nutrients.

Participants will be encouraged to seek out healthy basic ingredients at their local grocery stores and coached through the process of recognizing and selecting them.